“Cry Little Sister”—Gerard McMann
"How fresh?" I ask Tommy as we cross the busy street, evening rush hour well under way. I cradle a full coffee—probably my twentieth of the day—in both hands as Tommy manhandles two donuts. I stopped counting those around lunchtime.
"Examiners think within the last twenty-four. They figured we'd want to get a look at it before they carted her off." He chuckles, his mouth full of pastry. "It's a mess, partner."
"So I've been told. You said an abandoned house off Twelfth, right?" I ask just as we meet the intersection of Twelfth and Stark.
"Yeah." He points at a decrepit house a few hundred feet away blocked off by police tape with a clutter of personnel spread out around the area. Curious neighbors have taken to their porches. Tommy chuckles again, swallowing the last of his donut. "Fuckin' stray dog pulled the bitch's foot out of the house and into the street. That's how they fuckin' found her."
"You shitting me?"
"Do I ever?"
I just roll my eyes. I never know what to believe when it's coming out of Tommy's mouth.
"She's in about ten different pieces, partner. Scout's honor." He does a jacked-up Boy Scout salute then holds up the police tape for me to go underneath.
I nod in appreciation then pass a few more nods to some of the personnel I'm fond of, mingling in the front yard.
"Hacked up at every joint," he continues, "and at the neck. I mean, we're talking Mr. Potato Head type shit in there."
"Keep your voice down, you jackass." I roll my eyes as I pass through the doorway, the door itself hanging by one hinge. "It's been way too long of a day for that shit."
"Just speaking the truth, man. You'll see. She's like a human jigsaw puzzle." He laughs and slaps the back of his hand against my arm. "Like human Tetris." He laughs.
"Fuck off, man," I say, pulling away from him just as we come up on the body.
He wasn't lying. Not one fucking bit. There are two loaded up trash bags, each with shredded holes torn in the side. A trail of blood is smeared from the bags and tracked out into the hallway. Congealed fat, yellow and pungent, protrudes from the openings, along with bits of mangled, bloody flesh. I make out a hand too, purplish-blue fingers poking out from beneath the sludgy mess.
I step back, taking a much needed breath of fresh air from the other room, then go back in. Tommy stands in the corner of the room with two medical examiners, a stupid toothy smile on his face. I approach one of the bags and crouch, making sure to breathe only through my mouth, though I worry about what particles I'm picking up that way too. The thought turns my stomach. I pull a pen from my pocket and use the end of it to tug the bag open wider.
I wish I hadn't. The mostly untarnished face of a young brunette stares back at me. Her dead eyes bulge a bit from her head, skin and veins mushrooming from her severed neck, but otherwise, she looks like she probably had before all this happened to her… with a little rigor mortis added in the mix.
And she looks like my sister.
From the dark curls matted to her head with blood, to the blue-gray tint of her eyes, she's a spitting image of Joanna. And it reminds me of that day two years ago, when I found my sister in three pieces in a house not far from here. She had the same knifed-out Xs on her breasts that I'm sure to find on this young lady, just as I've found on many of the other victims along the way.
I close my eyes, my pulse quickening. My stomach lurches. My thoughts are owned by my sister, back when she was still that smiling, carefree girl, back before the drugs dried up all the life in her. When this monster got to her, she was just a shell of who she once was, but it hurt all the same.
If my parents were still alive, I would've surely gotten the blame somehow. You should've been there! Aren't you a cop?
It doesn't matter. I put the blame on myself anyway. I heap it onto my shoulders right along with the PTSD and alcoholism, along with the failed relationships and the thousands of little lies I've told myself over the years—and the ones I still do.
I stand abruptly, so quick a rush of blood leaves my brain and makes me stumble.
"Partner, you okay?" Tommy asks, putting a hand on my elbow to stabilize me.
"Y-yeah, I-I'm good." I look at him through clouded vision, blinking in an attempt to clear it. "You mind wrapping this up, Tommy? I've seen enough for today."
He gives me two good pats on the back as he leads me out of the room. "I got you, buddy. You definitely ain't looking so good."
"I'm all right. Just haven't eaten today yet." We reach the door, and I turn to face him. "I'm gonna go grab a bite and take some time to myself. You sure you're all right wrapping this up?"
"Too easy, partner. Too easy. Take your time. I'll start the paperwork on this shit." He jabs a thumb back toward the garbage bags now being carefully emptied by the examiners, their contents sorted out on a tarp.
"Thanks." I turn and head out the door, pulling a pack of cigarettes from my pocket, a pack I’ve held on to for when I catch my sister’s killer, but right about now, I just don’t fucking care. I need it.
I take off the cellophane wrapping, shake out a cigarette, and light it, taking the smoke deep into my lungs as a fall breeze whips past me. I let the smoke dance out of my lungs with a pleasing sigh. Six months I've held on to this pack. Six months since I had my last cigarette. The cigarette’s staleness does nothing to override the complete satisfaction I feel as a buzz carries through my body.
It's funny how the first day I smoke a cigarette in six months is the same day I attend church for the first time in ten years. God and I, we have a unique relationship. A little bit of love and a whole lot of hate… on my side only, of course. It's not that I blame him for my woes, because I don't. I just wonder sometimes why I couldn't have had it just a little bit different. Just a little bit better.
I couldn't help but to walk in as I was passing by, the preacher's voice carrying from the church. Calling to me. Before I knew what I was doing, my ass was in this pew, my cold heart despising every second of it.
I've always been a good man. I've always put others first. Yet since the day I was fucking born, I've been shit on. There comes a time when you stop blaming yourself, and guess what? The blame's gotta go somewhere. I'm a God-fearing man, I always will be, so any blasphemous outbursts could be counted on one hand. But in my head, I'm cursing him all day long. Not so much for myself, but mostly for my sister, who truly was a happy girl.
She loved life, and there were a lot of times I was envious of her complete lack of self-pity.
Then the drugs found her, then prostitution, and then she was gone. I was left to sweep up the scraps of my life, to view the vast wasteland around me where my family should've been.
My hands rest on top of the pew in front of me, and I settle my head onto my arms. I feel as if an invisible hand is gripping my heart and pulling it slowly up through my throat. I can feel the force of my faith tearing a hole through me, along with all my doubts, insecurities, and fear.
"If you'll read along with me in Corinthians 1:27 and 28," the preacher says in his best infomercial delivery. "'God has chosen the world's insignificant and despised things—the things viewed as nothing—so He might bring to nothing the things that are viewed as something.'" He sets his Bible on the podium and scans the pews before him. "God does not choose the wise. He chooses the wicked and weary. He chooses those who are looked down upon, turned away, disregarded."
I slide down the pew and quietly stand. Having had more than enough, I shuffle down the aisle as the preacher continues.
"And He chooses them to do His work. To spread His message and His love. Through him, all things are possible."
I give one last passing glance to the crucified Jesus hanging above the door before I exit the church, heading first to A-1 liquor, then I go back to the department, back to the bloodshed, back to the looked down upon, the turned away… the disregarded who make up my homicide reports.